Audio clip

Audio clip

I am a 1983 graduate of Kent State University. I walked up Blanket Hill to Taylor Hall nearly every day for two years, past a metal sculpture with a hole through it.

It, too, was in the path of a National Guard bullet.

Of course I knew about May 4, 1970. And I’d looked at the hole in the Don Drumm sculpture. But I never went to any of the memorial observances. I thought it was time for Kent State and Ohio to get past the past.

I’m not at all minimizing the tragedy of “four dead in Ohio.” It was just not my decade.

Last week, however, I did pay attention.

I learned how things unraveled in the face of frustration and misunderstanding. I learned that I failed to grasp essential American history in my zeal to learn journalism inside Taylor Hall.

What happened 40 years ago, as well as my recognition of it now, were both unforeseen.

The Vindicator, in preparing for stories in advance of the anniversary, obtained a transcription record, which is a very slow-spinning (16 2/3 rpm) two-sided vinyl disc. It’s from the 1971 Chestnut Burr, the KSU yearbook. Our managing editor asked if I would use some vintage equipment in my home studio to transfer the analog audio to digital.

I was on vacation last week and wasn’t too enthused about exhuming the tragedy, but I promised to deliver a CD to the newsroom in time for Sunday’s paper.

This soundtrack to tragedy remains incredible. I had never heard it before.

Side One contains news broadcasts leading up to the shooting. It starts with fire and breaking glass in downtown Kent; then more fire and an ROTC building falling in on campus. Tear gas lobbed near tennis courts. National Guardsmen are on hand to assist civil authorities and campus police.

You can’t really tell who is talking: university people, local authorities, a fire chief, Gov. Jim Rhodes.

A sampling:

“At the present time I think that Vietnam would be a pleasure.”

“The hopes of all on campus have been placed in jeopardy.”

“This now is the problem of the state of Ohio.”

“We’re gonna use every part of ... law enforcement to drive ’em out of Kent.”

Rhodes: “They’re the worst type of people that we harbor in America. I think that we’re up against the strongest, well-trained, militant, revolutionary group that has ever assembled in America.”